The Last Piece in Place

Tuesday

Mar 30, 2010 at 12:01 AMMar 31, 2010 at 5:08 AM

In Alexandria, Va., President Obama signed into law the final piece of the Democrats' health care overhaul.

DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

President Obama signed the budget reconciliation bill containing a package of revisions to the big health care legislation after giving a speech at Northern Virginia Community College, a setting aimed at drawing attention to the education component of the bill.

Mr. Obama was introduced by Jill Biden, the wife of the vice president, who teaches English at the college in Alexandria, Va.

The reconciliation measure includes a landmark overhaul of federal student loan programs that will save taxpayers more than $60 billion by ending subsidies to private banks. The money will be redirected to education programs, including an expansion of Pell grants, and $2 billion in aid to community colleges over the next four years. Mr. Obama also said that he had asked Mrs. Biden to hold a forum on community colleges at the White House next fall.

The signing ceremony in Virginia marked the formal enactment of the legislation that Mr. Obama long declared to be his top domestic priority. Attention will now turn to the efforts by his administration to implement the law, by Democrats to explain the law to constituents and by Republicans to use it as a weapon against Democrats in the November midterm elections with calls to "repeal and replace" it.

"Today we mark an important milestone on the road to health insurance reform and higher education reform," Mr. Obama said. "But more broadly, this day affirms our ability to overcome the challenges of our politics and meet the challenges of our time."

He continued, "When I took office, one of the questions we needed to answer was whether it was still possible to make government responsive to the needs of everyday people, middle-class Americans, the backbone of this country, or whether the special interests and their lobbyists would continue to hold sway like they've done so many times before. And that's a test we met one week ago, when health insurance reform became the law of the land in the United States of America."

It was indeed precisely one week ago that Mr. Obama held a signing ceremony in the East Room of the White House to enact the main health care bill. In Virginia on Tuesday, as in the first ceremony at the White House last week, the president singled out House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the most abundant praise in getting the legislation through Congress. He also lauded the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid of Nevada.

In his speech, Mr. Obama also sought to temper some expectations. "The health insurance reform bill I signed won't fix every problem in our health-care system in one fell swoop," he said. "But it does represent some of the toughest insurance reforms in history. It represents a major step forward toward giving Americans with insurance and those without a sense of security when it comes to their health care. It enshrines the principle that when you get sick you've got a society there, a community that is going to help you get back on your feet. It represents meaningful progress for the American people."

He noted some of the revisions in the bill, including an increase in tax credits to help moderate-income Americans purchase private insurance, and a $250 rebate this year for Medicare beneficiaries who fall into the prescription drug coverage gap known as the "doughnut hole."

The subsidies for purchasing insurance begin in 2014, when new state-run insurance exchanges, or marketplaces, are scheduled to be up and running so that Americans buying their own coverage can compare benefits packages and premium prices and pick a plan.

Mr. Obama also noted that the reconciliation includes even more money for community health centers, which are slated to get billions of dollars as a result of the legislation. The community health centers provide primary care in many parts of the country, especially rural areas, where doctors are lacking.

But much of his speech focused on the education provisions in the bill, and Mr. Obama got several grateful rounds of applause from students in his audience.

"For almost two decades, we've been trying to fix a sweetheart deal in federal law that essentially gave billions of dollars to banks to act as unnecessary middlemen in administering student loans," he said. "Those are billions of dollars that could have been spent helping more of our students attend and complete college, that could have been spent advancing the dreams of our children, that could have been spent easing the burden of tuition on middle-class families. Instead, that money was spent padding student lenders' profits."

The education provisions were adopted despite fierce opposition by private banks, and Mr. Obama could not resist declaring victory in that battle. "It probably won't surprise you to learn that the big banks and financial institutions hired an army of lobbyists to protect the status quo," he said. "In fact, Sallie Mae, America's biggest student lender, spent more than $3 million on lobbying last year alone. But I didn't stand with the banks and the financial industries in this fight. That's not why I came to Washington. And neither did any of the members of Congress who are here today. We stood with you. We stood with America's students."

A number of lawmakers opposed the reconciliation bill in part because of the student loan provisions. Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, who voted in favor of the health care legislation in December, voted against the reconciliation bill. Nelnet, one of the nation's largest private student lenders, is headquartered in Mr. Nelson's home state.

Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee and a former federal education secretary, also spoke out angrily against the plan to end the subsidies to private banks. Tennessee is also home to some big players in the private student lending industry.

Mr. Obama closed his remarks saying that health and education policies would help form a new framework for the economy. "From the moment I was sworn into office, I've spoken about the urgent need for us to lay a new foundation for our economy and for our future and two pillars of that foundation are health care and education, and each has long suffered from problems that we chose to kick down the road," he said.

Read more about the signing at The Caucus.

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